Over 70 foreign students from 21 countries recently attended a three - day getaway to Anhui Province. Hosted by Shanghai International Studies University (SISU) as part of the Shanghai Summer School program, the journey included climbing Huangshan Mountain and visiting Hongcun village and its tea plantations, enhancing the students' understanding of Chinese culture.

Shanghai Summer School (3S) is a scholarship program launched by Shanghai Municipal Education Commission as a window for international cooperation. It aims to set up a platform for educational exchanges between Shanghai and the world while attracting talented foreign students to study in Shanghai and learn the Chinese language while experiencing local culture.

During the one-month program, foreign students engage in intensive language learning and cultural exploring activities through various projects provided by dozens of colleges and universities in Shanghai.

This year, SISU hosted four projects affiliated to the 3S program: the Spanish-Speaking Countries Project, the Russian Project, the Belt and Road Countries Project, and the Middle East Project.

They hoped these would arouse further international interest in Chinese history as well as the social development of contemporary China.

Students were arranged according to their language skills and provided tailor-made curriculum. SISU also offered a rich array of extracurricular activities to allow the foreign students to interact with Chinese people, including visiting Shanghainese families, practicing Chinese traditional calligraphy and tai chi boxing, sightseeing and attending lectures on Chinese culture, diplomacy and economics by professors from various local universities.

In addition, SISU paired each international student with a Chinese student as language partners to enhance and facilitate communication between the youth.

Zhang Hongjiang, project supervisor of the Office of International Students Affairs, School of Chinese Studies and Exchange, SISU, told the Global Times that:

"It was a huge undertaking to implement all of these activities while making sure that students coming from different countries with different social habits and customs feel comfortable and at home in Shanghai."

Based on his observations, most of the foreign students were more interested in the recent development of modern China, including its mobile payment and shared-economy systems, which haven't yet been accurately or thoroughly included in Western educational curriculum. Zhang said:

"They may have heard about Confucius and calligraphy, but they don't know much about Alipay or Mobike or the rapid development of China's Internet industry."